Soldiers who are supposed to be protecting villagers from settler attacks occupy a house in Iraq Burin.

The Israeli military sent eight jeep loads of soldiers to Iraq Burin, near Nablus, on Saturday to prevent villagers from accessing their farmland. Violent settler attacks on previous Saturdays leave the villagers and their land threatened. The military’s solution to these attacks has not been to protect the Palestinians, but rather to deny them access to their land.

As the men of Iraq Burin sat peacefully at the edge of their village, watching soldiers and settlers on their terraces and in their olive groves on the opposite hillside, another group of soldiers approached from the hill immediately above the village.

Contested fields in Iraq Burin.

With no apparent provocation or reason, soldiers fired volleys of tear gas and percussion grenades at the assembled villagers, then seized houses at the edge of the village to fire rubber bullets and more tear gas into the street. Despite this barrage of weaponry, villagers refused to run and hide, and the soldiers ultimately retreated at dusk.

Several Palestinians and one international were hit with rubber bullets and tear gas canisters, though no serious injuries were reported.